Support road.cc

Like this site? Help us to make it better.

Motorist arrested after two cyclists killed in suspected hit-and-run

A 37-year-old has been arrested on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving after a car was found abandoned a mile from the scene of the fatal collision

South Yorkshire Police have appealed for information after two cyclists were killed in a suspected hit-and-run incident in Barnsley on Friday.

The two men, who have yet to be formally identified by officers, are believed to have been struck by a motorist driving a red Volkswagen Golf on the Royston Road in the village of Cudworth, a few miles north-east of Barnsley, just after 9pm on Friday.

Both cyclists were pronounced dead at the scene.

The motorist failed to stop following the collision, and the car was later found abandoned in Bleak Avenue, Shafton, around a mile from where the incident took place.

South Yorkshire Police confirmed yesterday that they have arrested a 37-year-old man on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving. Officers are currently working to track down a second suspect.

"We are appealing for anyone who witnessed the incident or who was driving in the area at the time and may have seen the Volkswagen Golf or cyclists to get in touch. We are particularly keen to hear from those with dash-cam footage,” a police spokesperson said.

Anyone with information has been asked to contact South Yorkshire Police through the live chat facility on their website, their online portal, or by calling 101, quoting incident number 1089 of 20 January.

Dash cam footage can be emailed to enquiries [at] southyorks.pnn.police.uk.

Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.

Add new comment

24 comments

Avatar
Owd Big 'Ead | 1 year ago
4 likes

Another hit and run.
Becoming more and more common.
Where has peoples moral standards disappeared to?
Since Covid no one seems to give a fuck anymore.

Avatar
ChrisB200SX replied to Owd Big 'Ead | 1 year ago
0 likes

Leadership. If the people in government for 13 years have zero morals, the public will tend to follow.

Avatar
ChrisB200SX | 1 year ago
6 likes

We're barely into the 4th week of 2023 and the number of cyclists killed by drivers in the UK is racking up at a worrying rate.

Could someone compile a list of the cases like Bez used to do on beyondthekerb? Or just a running total as I'm sure that's at least 5 this week and putting number to it might help the public understand the severity of the problem of dangerous driving.

Avatar
psbcycle | 1 year ago
6 likes
Avatar
peted76 replied to psbcycle | 1 year ago
6 likes

psbcycle wrote:

ban dangerous drivers for life:

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/623592?fbclid=IwAR2bOZctGlbjWuX...

That petition doesn't go far enough. Banning people after they've killed someone is not enough. The whole punishment/points system for owning a motor vehicle licence needs overhauling. Owning a licence should be seen as a privilege and not a right. All serious driving offences should carry the threat of a lifetime ban. If you can't be trusted to drive responsibly, then simply, you should not be allowed to drive. 

Avatar
Bungle_52 replied to peted76 | 1 year ago
4 likes

You are correct but this is a move in the right direction and the more often parliament has to respond the more likely we are to get change. The petition is now at 7539. 2461 needed to get a response.

I hope I got my sums right.

Avatar
Simon E replied to peted76 | 1 year ago
7 likes

peted76 wrote:

The whole punishment/points system for owning a motor vehicle licence needs overhauling. Owning a licence should be seen as a privilege and not a right.

More importantly, the whole culture around car ownership and use - i.e. the way it is used on public roads - needs to change.

While big, powerful and fast cars are promoted and idolised, whether through the huge $$$ involved in motorsport and the marketing of cars that are capable of huge speed with no restraint then things won't change.

The possibility of a driving ban, whether for a year or for life, won't work in the same way that life sentences and even capital punishment do not not deter people from committing serious crimes.

However, I'd be happy to see those who are caught while already banned being put in prison (and it being made crystal clear when they are sentenced that this will happen if they are caught). Also that 12 points means a ban without the cop-out of pleading 'exceptional hardship', a crappy excuse for repeatedly flouting the Law has been abused far too many times already.

Avatar
peted76 replied to Simon E | 1 year ago
4 likes

Agree..  as far as I'm concerned a motorised vehicle should be considered a weapon in the eyes of the law. 

More realistically though.. I can't see a good reason why we have cars which can do over 70mph on the roads. Also the technology is in place today to have your car restrict it'self to the roads speed limit, so why don't we just enforce speed limits at the car level. This wouldn't stop people driving like idiots, but it 'might' force a change how we approach and loot at travelling by car. .  "The DTLR has stated that "speed is a major contributory factor in around one third of all road traffic accidents. This means that each year excessive and inappropriate speed helps to kill 1,200 people and to injure over 100,000 more". -  https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200102/cmselect/cmtlgr/557/55705...

Also if I had a wand, I'd ban the widest cars.. they are simply unnecessary and take too much room on the road. Limit all cars sold to 1.8m width maximum, promote small car useage, reduce pollution, wearand tear on the roads.

Avatar
brooksby replied to peted76 | 1 year ago
9 likes

peted76 wrote:

Also if I had a wand, I'd ban the widest cars.. they are simply unnecessary and take too much room on the road.

You mean like when someone driving on their own in an SUV in a urban environment complains about a cyclist 'taking up all the road'...?

 

Avatar
chrisonabike replied to brooksby | 1 year ago
3 likes

Yes.  However as we know the logic always runs in the opposite direction for "prestige technology" / "stuff the government isn't against".  So it goes: because there aren't rules against it, someone will do it.  If the fad gets traction (realistically - if some company heavily promotes it to make them money) it may then become the norm as everyone rushes to get their piece of the action.  At that point, "our streets / garages / parking spaces are too narrow!".  There's then massive pressure from people AND organisations on authorities to make everywhere suitable for the new thing and codify that.

This actually happens.  Plenty of actual complaints of "we have to park on the road because our garage is too small for the (now standard) vehicles we bought".  Or "we have to have three cars - we both have jobs and our eldest needs a car - and there is only space for one on the drive".

Avatar
Hirsute replied to peted76 | 1 year ago
3 likes

The met reported last year a figure of 50%. The third was based on the initial findings but when they analysed the final reports, it was found to be higher at around half.

We do need restrictions on size. I was behind an x6 at the w/e - no one needs a car of that size.

Avatar
BalladOfStruth replied to Hirsute | 1 year ago
3 likes

hirsute wrote:

The met reported last year a figure of 50%. The third was based on the initial findings but when they analysed the final reports, it was found to be higher at around half.

I read an article a while back talking about how there'd been a policy change where police reporting was based more on post-accident investigation rather than the he-said-she-said at the scene. Most forces found that speed shot up from being a contributing factor in ~15% to around 50% of crashes. Which makes sense when you look at DfT speed compliance stats.

hirsute wrote:

We do need restrictions on size. I was behind an x6 at the w/e - no one needs a car of that size.

Very much so. Two worrying trends that I've noticed recently are: just how little someone is willing to walk before reaching for their car keys (a recent survey concluded ~530m is as far as the average Brit would walk before deciding to drive instead), and that everyone has suddenly decided that they need a massive 2.5 tonne SUV because it's the current fashion. They are too big for our roads.

Avatar
brooksby replied to BalladOfStruth | 1 year ago
4 likes

BalladOfStruth wrote:

a recent survey concluded ~530m is as far as the average Brit would walk before deciding to drive instead)

  If that's the average, and we (road.cc readers, obviously) are all skewing the average up, then there are a great many people who would just not walk. At all.

Avatar
BalladOfStruth replied to brooksby | 1 year ago
6 likes

It did seem startlingly low to me as well (I think my letterbox is actuallly further away than that), but looking at the village where I used to live, I'd regularly see neighbours drive to local corner shops or drop thier kids off at school by car (journeys of 200-300m), so I can believe it.

There are commenters on this site that tell us that we shouldn't try to reduce car use because that would be like "19th century living". And others that will claim that they live in St Just and work in Glasgow, so obviously everyone needs to make every journey by car. But the reality is that the average car journey is pretty short, and a lot of car journeys (personally I'd say around half) really cannot be justified as being car journeys. Sure, we need to improve public transport and active travel infra, also things like the 4-day week and WFH being enshrined as a right for any job where it would be feasable would take a lot of cars off the road. But honestly, I think a big part of the problem is that there's a worrying number of people that would actually drive to the fridge if they could.

Avatar
andystow replied to BalladOfStruth | 1 year ago
3 likes

BalladOfStruth wrote:

It did seem startlingly low to me as well (I think my letterbox is actuallly further away than that), but looking at the village where I used to live, I'd regularly see neighbours drive to local corner shops or drop thier kids off at school by car (journeys of 200-300m), so I can believe it.

I have literally seen people with long-ish driveways on my work commute drive to their letterbox. I just measured one using Google Maps, it's about 60 metres.

Avatar
NOtotheEU replied to andystow | 1 year ago
0 likes

How to say you're in North America without actually saying it.

Avatar
hawkinspeter replied to brooksby | 1 year ago
7 likes

brooksby wrote:

BalladOfStruth wrote:

a recent survey concluded ~530m is as far as the average Brit would walk before deciding to drive instead)

  If that's the average, and we (road.cc readers, obviously) are all skewing the average up, then there are a great many people who would just not walk. At all.

Did they factor in The Proclaimers?

Avatar
Hirsute replied to BalladOfStruth | 1 year ago
3 likes

And people complain car parks spaces are too small because they can't fit their massive jugernaut in it !

Avatar
wtjs replied to BalladOfStruth | 1 year ago
2 likes

a recent survey concluded ~530m is as far as the average Brit would walk before deciding to drive instead

And that's when they're lying to look eco-friendly! In truth, it's going to be 200m

Avatar
ktache replied to BalladOfStruth | 1 year ago
0 likes

And heavy.

And those batteries are going to add more weight.

Avatar
wtjs replied to Hirsute | 1 year ago
3 likes

 I was behind an x6 at the w/e - no one needs a car of that size

I was in front of an A6 yesterday- L1 NYR, £40,000 or so, which has been without MOT for a month. He will be waved through with a 'nothing to see here' by Lancashire Constabulary- that's why you need a car of that size and price, because of the intangible benefits!

Avatar
mattw replied to wtjs | 1 year ago
0 likes

I have a car of that size, albeit a Skoda.

Mine was specced to carry a set of house doors in the back flat, and to be able to tow 2 tons.

With the 'we'll match the carwow 25% discount' from the dealer it came in about 25 less than the Audi, which wasn't big enough inside anyway and makes people hate you.

Avatar
BIRMINGHAMisaDUMP | 1 year ago
1 like

This is terrible. There must be severe punishment for this type of crime. No excuses .  

Avatar
NOtotheEU | 1 year ago
19 likes

It's sad to see yet another two families devastated by dangerous driving. This story was considered important enough to be on the national (radio) news earlier today which is unusual. Good to hear they have already arrested a suspect but not looking forward to the inevitable lenient sentence.

What sort of car was it? . . . . Oh, needn't have asked.

Latest Comments